ATLRetro

Chambers of Horror, Atlanta’s adults-only haunt behind The Masquerade, has come a long way from a torture porn extravaganza to a creepy crawl through a septic, gritty underworld where atmosphere and story are strengths. This year’s storyline involves a plague infection of alien origin now running rampant in the underground of Dr. Splatter’s lurid experiments. This’ll be the last year at this location due to pending construction, so kudos to Luke Godfrey (ATLRetro exclusive interview with him here) and Ian O’Brien of Gorehound Productions for whipping up a must-see attraction, as long as you have a stomach for  extreme violence and the phantasmagorically pornographic. Let’s be clear–you won’t be seeing parasexual activity, but nakedness and deformed organs, including sexual ones, are in view.

If you visited Chambers only in its first two years, you missed its escalation into a full-out immersive performance experience similar to that which made the Atlanta Zombie Apocalypse more than your usual walk-through haunt. Similar to the prelude to a Splatter Cinema evening (also ran and co-founded by Godfrey) begin with a photo op with a grisly prop with a green screen backdrop that by the finished print will reveal additional horrors. That’s followed by a video setting up the outbreak premise. Visitors are scanned for the alien virus and then ushered into an elevator that shakes and shudders to evoke a realistic ride down five stories into the depths that once were TortureCo and are now a US military facility. The point of a haunt is surprise, so without any spoilers, let’s just say that along the journey, visitors encounter scenarios with paramilitary officers, mutilated infected scientists and victims of twisted experiments engaged in disturbing dioramas. Sure, there were some jumpy scares and victims cried out mournfully for help, but haunt-goers are encouraged to linger and listen as the plotline unfolds and torturers threaten and tantalize visitors with a promise of pain.

One warning: Don’t dress in anything which you mind getting wet and even, on one occasion, foamy.

Chambers of Horror is open Wed. Oct. 28 and Thurs. Oct. 29 from 8 pm until midnight, and Fri. Oct. 30 and Halloween from 8 p.m. to 1 a.m. Tickets are available at the door, or you can purchase them online in advance at Xorbia – Chambers of Horror Tickets

by Melanie Crew
Managing Editor

Calling all ghouls and gals! Come see why we think you should raise hell in Retro Atlanta this Halloween season!

1. Head Rolling Tunes! Get sinister All Hallows Eve (weekend) with a helluva lot of rancid rock ‘n roll! The Star Bar gets hellacious this weekend with Hell Night featuring BigFoot, Timmy James & the Blue Flames and Night Terrors on Friday (10/30)! Or get your horror punk fix with their 24th Anniversary Party & Halloween Bash featuring Horror Business, Pretty Vacant, Salad Days, Road to Ruin and Kool Kats The Casket Creatures on Saturday (10/31)! Get monstrous and go, go Godzilla on down to the Variety Playhouse for a night with the Blue Oyster Cult (10/30)! Rock out retro-style with The B-52s during their “Halloween Scream” show at the Fox Theatre (10/30)! The Earl gets monstrously metal with their Halloween party featuring Wolf Eyes, Timmy’s Organism, Video and Uniform (10/30)! And Smith’s Olde Bar terrifies with their Howl ‘o’ Ween rockin’ tribute night featuring The Cherry Bomb (Joan Jett); Learning to Count (Ramones); and TNT (AC/DC) (10/30)

2. Fangtastic Films! Halloween just isn’t the same without blood-filled horror flicks! If you’re craving the crazed, catch John Carpenter’s HALLOWEEN (1978) at 7:30pm across town [Hollywood Stadium 24 in Chamblee; AMC Avenue Forsyth 12 in Cumming; AMC Barrett Commons 24 in Kennesaw; AMC Sugarloaf Mills 18 in Lawrenceville; and Georgian Stadium in Newnan] on Thursday (10/29)! The Plaza Theater delivers killer screenings with Gerald Kargl’s ANGST (1983) (10/29); Victor and Edward Halperin’s monstrous classic, WHITE ZOMBIE (1932) (10/30); and don’t forget to Time-Warp it up with some uber musically-inclined transsexual aliens at as they continue their tradition of screening THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW (1975), featuring the live cast of Lips Down on Dixie at midnight, with special Halloween treats (10/30)! Get bewitched with a screening of Kenny Ortega’s HOCUS POCUS (1993) at dusk at Atlantic Station during their “Spooky Film Fest” (10/30)! Ghosts invade Studio Movie Grill (Alpharetta/Duluth) with their 30th Anniversary screening of Ivan Reitman’s GHOSTBUSTERS (1984) at 7pm/9:30pm (10/30)! Celebrate 40 years with Dr. Frank-N-Furter and Jim Sharman’s cult classic, THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW (1975) at AMC Phipps Plaza at 10pm (10/30-10/31)! The 9th Annual Atlanta Horror Film Festival haunts at DooGallery featuring 70 independent horror films from across the world (10/28-10/30)! And get homicidal at The Earl Smith Strand Theatre with their screening of Alfred Hitchcock’s horror masterpiece, PSYCHO (1960) at 8pm (10/31)!

3. Dance with the Dead. Do the Monster Mash with DJ Evil Jet at the Euclid Avenue Yacht Club’s annual Halloween Bash (10/31)! Pallookaville celebrates All Hallows Eve and their second year of corndogula slingin’ with their Ice Scream Ball & Halloweiner, featuring drink specials, music, tricks & treats, costume contests and more (10/31)! Or get ghastly and groove on down to Mary’s for their Hallo-Weenie Dance Party (10/30), followed by their Scary-oke! shindig and costume contest on Halloween night (10/31)! Or rattle your bones during Fernbank Museum of Natural History’s Martinis and IMAX’s Fright Night Halloween Party, dripping with devilish drinks, costume contests and more (10/30)! Spook on down to Callanwolde Fine Arts Center for their “Halloween Night on Callanwolde Mountain” family-friendly party featuring trick-or-treating, live music with the Callanwolde Concert Band featuring Matthew Kaminski, costume contests and more (10/30)! And party it up in Virginia Highlands with their Halloween Night in the Highlands event featuring costume contests and more (10/31)!

4. Gothic & Ghastly. It’s a night of gothic chills at Atlanta Symphony Hall as the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra presents a night of Danny Elfman’s music from the films of Tim Burton at 8pm (10/31)! Haunt on down to the Historic Oakland Cemetery for their annual hour-long Capturing the Spirit of Oakland 2015 Ghost Tours, featuring music, a fortune teller and more! Come on out and tiptoe through the graves, make a few new spirited friends and hear the hallowed tales of some of their eternal residents, running from 5:30pm to 10:30pm (10/29-10/31)!

5. Horrifying Haunts. It’s a gore-fest at Chambers of Horror Haunted House at the Masquerade as they terrify with their adults-only blood-infested splatter-fest [10/29-11/1, 8pm-12am/1am (weekend)]! Or creep on down to Netherworld Haunted House in Norcross and spook it up through Nov. 1 (7:30pm-10:30pm week days; 7pm-midnight weekends)!

6. Thrilling and Chilling Theatrics. Be the Headless Horseman’s next victim and get your bones chilled at Serenbe Playhouse’s thrilling presentation of their immersive spooky attraction and show, THE SLEEPY HOLLOW EXPERIENCE, haunting through Nov. 8 (Wed-Sun at 8pm; Fri-Sat at 10:30pm)! The Arts Exchange spooks it up with their Halloween 2015 party featuring performance art, a spooky amphitheatre and experimental music at 8pm (10/31)! Get immortal with the Center for Puppetry Arts’ presentation of Jon Ludwig and Jason Hines’ THE GHASTLY DREADFULS: RAISING SPIRITS adults-only spook show filled with creepy stories, devilish dances and more (10/28-10/31; 8pm)!

7. Psychotically Psychedelic. Rattle your bones and get psychedelic at the Red Light Café with their Night of the Dead Halloween Party featuring gr8FLdude & frenz and Dead Affect (10/31)! Or jam it up with Honeywood during their Halloween show at the Crimson Moon Café (10/31)! And it’s “Hawgtoberfest” at Hottie Hawgs BBQ with Swami Gone Bananas (10/31)!

8. Tricks or Tikis! Trader Vic’s takes a big hairy bite out of you with their Werewolves of London Halloween dinner event, featuring a prix fixe menu ($35/person) including monstrous starters, entrées and desserts. Werewolves & Pina Coladas, OH MY! Trader Vic’s calls all werewolves to come in & enjoy Pina Coladas à la Warren Zevon‘s “Werewolves of London” this Halloween! Costumes are encouraged & are worn best if your hair is perfect! Doors Open at 5:00 p.m. (10/30)!

9. Decaying Eighties. ATL Collective delivers two nights of rotting flesh as they raise the dead with their performance of Michael Jackson’s Halloween classic, “Thriller” at Vinyl (10/30-10/31)! Or do the Monster Mash at Steve’s Live Music as they dish out a spooky night with The Lizardmen and Devomatix (Devo tribute) (10/31)! Kool Kat Becky Cormier Finch and Denim Arcade deliver a rockin’ ‘80s Halloween show at the Dallas Public House (10/31)!

10. Groove Like a Ghoul! It’s a night of boos and blues as Danny ‘Mudcat’ Dudeck and the Atlanta Horns get down at their annual Halloween Bamboo Au Go Go Party with The Reverend & the Lady and Yoshito Kiyono at the Northside Tavern (10/31)! Put on those dancin’ shoes groove like a ghoul at The Basement as they get down with forty thousand years of funk during their Keep on Movin’ Halloween Dance Party (10/31)! And get ghastly and groove on down to the The Music Room for the Dangerfeel Newbies’ Soul of Jazz Halloween Jam (10/31)!

Splatter Cinema presents GREMLINS 2: THE NEW BATCH (1990); Dir. Joe Dante; Starring Zach Galligan, Phoebe Cates and Christopher Lee; Tuesday, Dec. 9 @ 8:00 p.m.; Cinevision Screening Room; Tickets $10 (cash only); Trailer here.

By Aleck Bennett
Contributing Writer

Splatter Cinema is back! After a brief spell hosting films at the Chambers of Horror Halloween haunt, Splatter has teamed up with ATLRetro Kool Kat Ben Ruder’s Enjoy the Film and the Cinevision Screening Room to bring us the brilliantly bloody and the sublimely sickening. And while this month’s feature probably isn’t the first flick to spring to mind when you think “splatter,” its wildly imaginative and horrific effects work, combined with its completely uninhibited attitude, all add up to a perfect way to kick off a new era of Splatterdom this holiday season. Because after a seven-year search for a 35mm print, they have returned to bring you…GREMLINS 2: THE NEW BATCH.

There are people who sincerely believe that a sequel is automatically inferior to its predecessor. They’ll tell you, for instance, that STAR WARS is a de facto better movie than THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK because it laid the necessary groundwork for the latter film’s existence. These people are what I like to call “wrong.”

Case in point: GREMLINS 2: THE NEW BATCH. Now, don’t misjudge my feelings: I unabashedly love the original GREMLINS. It’s one of my favorite Christmas movies and I’ve gone on about it at length here before. But I have a special place in my heart for its sequel. And that place is front row center. While GREMLINS paints a raucous picture of monster-fueled anarchy breaking out in idyllic Small Town, USA, GREMLINS 2 is pure madness in the Big Apple from start to finish.

As opposed to the more direct plotting of the first film, the storyline in GREMLINS 2 is more a series of hooks from which director Joe Dante can hang gags; and as such, it’s pretty all over the place. After the death of Gizmo’s owner Mr. Wing, the mogwai falls into the hands of the science division of Clamp Enterprises (headed by the always-welcome Christopher Lee). He is rescued by old friends and coincidental Clamp employees Billy Peltzer and his fiancée Kate Beringer (Zach Galligan and Phoebe Cates, reprising their roles from the first film). However, a series of accidents cause more mogwai to be created, and havoc erupts in the locked-down Clamp Center as the gremlins plan to escape into New York City. There are constant sub-plots about disgruntled cable-show hosts, Billy’s job prospects and his flirtatious boss, out-of-town visitors, etc. But as I said, they’re mainly there to provide launching pads for parodies and jokes.

While the first movie evoked the feeling of Chuck Jones’ Looney Tunes shorts with its self-referential send-ups of Spielbergian cinematic suburbia, it still played within the confines of a Spielberg movie or a late-period Jones cartoon. It was dark and violent, but still warm in the way that producer Steven Spielberg’s family films and so many of Chuck Jones’ later cartoons frequently are. Jones’ HOW THE GRINCH STOLE CHRISTMAS, for instance, lets us relish the Grinch’s delicious villainy by softening the blow with redemption and acceptance. Lessons are learned, people get better, and he—he himself, the Grinch—carved the roast beast.

GREMLINS 2, on the other hand, channels pure bizarro Jones. I’m talking DUCK AMUCK. THE DOVER BOYS AT PIMENTO UNIVERSITY. DUCK DODGERS IN THE 24 ½TH CENTURY. It’s almost nothing but wall-to-wall psychosis and fourth-wall breaking. It knowingly and overtly parodies GREMLINS. (At one point Leonard Maltin shows up to pan the first film, and is attacked and devoured by mogwai.) It features Christopher Lee as…well, Christopher Lee playing a villain. Sure, the character is nominally Dr. Catheter, but the point of his presence is for Christopher Lee to be identifiably playing Christopher Lee playing a villain—much like how he shows up in THE MAGIC CHRISTIAN to play Christopher Lee playing Dracula. There are countless in-jokes hidden away in background details, like some Will Elder story in a 1950s issue of MAD. There are parodies of other films, like RAMBO, THE WIZARD OF OZ, KING KONG, THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA and many more. Daniel Clamp, the head of Clamp Enterprises with a burgeoning cable television empire, is a parody of both Donald Trump and Ted Turner. Even Al Lewis’ late-1980s stint for Turner as “Grandpa” hosting horror flicks on TBS’ SUPER SCARY SATURDAY is parodied. Hulk Hogan shows up for no good reason whatsoever. A plot turn that sees the mogwai become genetically mutated not only allows a Wile E. Coyote-esque “super genius” gremlin to exist, but also creates a hotsy-totsy female mogwai in order to bring us some “Bugs Bunny in drag” sequences. And to drive the point home completely, Bugs and Daffy Duck bookend the movie. If the first movie let the insanity of a Warner Brothers cartoon invade our mundane reality, this movie rejects your reality and substitutes its own.

All this to say that there is nothing in this movie I do not love wholeheartedly. Far from being sleek and streamlined, this movie is maximalism in action: gag piled on top of gag, with everyone involved in the movie completely game. Joe Dante is at his peak here, with impeccable timing and incredibly nuanced detail all in the service of pure wackiness. Christopher Lee gets to show off his rarely utilized comic chops. Tony Randall—Tony Randall, people!—is absolutely perfect as the super-intelligent Brain Gremlin. Dick Miller has a sizeable role, and that’s practically reason enough to see it right there. The screenplay by Charlie Haas (OVER THE EDGE, MATINEE) captures just the right balance of meta-humor and cleverly constructed plot dynamics so that we are never just bogged down in jokes; there’s a solid through-line that propels us along. Throw in the typically top-notch (and at times both monstrous and disgusting) effects work of Rick Baker and his crew, along with the gift of a bigger budget, and you’ve got a sequel that is every bit the equal of its predecessor, if not surpassing it.

Aleck Bennett is a writer, blogger, pug warden, pop culture enthusiast, raconteur and bon vivant from the greater Atlanta area. Visit his blog at doctorsardonicus.wordpress.com

By Anya Martin, Editor/Publisher Melanie Crew, Managing Editor
Rachel Stark, Guest Reviewer

The horror! The horror! Thanks to some dedicated monster-lovers, Atlanta has become the year-round capital city of Scary. This October our local terrifying talent again has outdone themselves in creepy creativity. Here are our reviews of our top three picks for Atlanta’s hottest haunted attractions. One general tip for all: wear comfortable closed toe shoes and clothes that you don’t mind getting moist. The monsters may tell you they are spurting you with blood or other bodily fluids, but it’s just water. Well, we think it is.

Buried Alive! Film Festival; Friday, Nov. 8 @ 7:00 p.m. – 1:30 a.m.; Saturday, Nov. 9 @ 3 p.m. – 1:00 a.m.; Plaza Theatre; Schedule here; Tickets $40 (all access, both days), $10 per programming block, available here and at the Plaza Theatre box office.

By Aleck Bennett
Contributing Writer

Who says that Halloween has to end with the month of October? Take a journey into the future of horror with a weekend of groundbreaking short-and-long-form cinema as the Buried Alive! Film Festival takes over the Plaza Theatre this Friday and Saturday November 8 and 9!

The festival was founded by local horror fiend Luke Godfrey, whom you’ll know as the co-creator of Chambers of Horror (Atlanta’s only adult Halloween attraction and this year’s ATL Retro pick for Haint of the Season) and the award-winning film series Splatter Cinema, as well as being the undead head of Zombie Walk Atlanta. Buried Alive! Film Fest has proven year after year to be one of the many reasons that Atlanta is recognized as among the horror capitals of the world, and this year proves to be no exception as Festival Director and filmmaker Blake Myers has loaded the schedule with the acclaimed, the weird, the wonderful and the outright outrageous.

The festival opens Friday night at 7:30 with the “Evil Everywhere! Shorts Program.” Transgressive German horror auteur Jörg Buttgereit (NEKROMANTIK 1 & 2, DER TODESKING, SCHRAMM: INTO THE MIND OF A SERIAL KILLER) reverently opens the show with A MOMENT OF SILENCE AT THE GRAVE OF ED GEIN. From there, we are treated to a series of shorts focusing on the presence of evil in the most unlikely of places. Atlanta-based explorations into this dark realm are represented by the memory-triggering subterranean chamber of CHLORINE, the hidden horrors of a quaint bed and breakfast in BURIED BENEATH and the dangerous efforts of a father and son to rescue a loved one from a cult in BAIT. Other standouts in this selection are the surreal and hellish underground Miami fighting ring of C#CKFIGHT, the promise of an innocent ride home detoured in NEXT EXIT, the trials of a boy thwarting a bullying monster in the acclaimed dark fantasy of SHHH… and the menacing, encroaching shadows of shelter in REFUGIO 115.

This all leads to the 9:30 opening night feature, PIECES OF TALENT, preceded by the short film TERRITORIAL. While TERRITORIAL paints a darkly comic tale of a man settling in for a nice weekend, PIECES OF TALENT takes a more harrowing path, as aspiring actress Charlotte is swept into the plans of charming local filmmaker David. David is obsessed with creating a piece of “true art”—and that creation means a series of brutal on-screen deaths, with Charlotte as the climactic setpiece.

Following the screening, the opening night party of the festival will be held at The Workshop on North Highland (one mile from the Plaza) from 11:30 p.m. to 1:30 a.m. Episodes of [adult swim] favorite YOUR PRETTY FACE IS GOING TO HELL (with effects and art direction from ATL Retro Kool Kats of the Week Shane Morton and Chris Brown) will be projected outdoors, while filmmakers from around the world will congregate to talk movies and generally have a fantastic time.

After you’ve rested and recuperated from the opening night party, the festival picks up once again at 3:00 p.m. with the “Weird and Wild Shorts Program.” As the title promises, this series takes a more off-the-wall (and at times darkly humorous) approach to the genre. Local highlights on offer here depict some unexpected changes under the light of the full moon in WEREHOOKER, the nefarious plans of an innocuous-looking clown in ALL YOU CAN EAT, and the comic domestication of the living dead in WELCOME TO THE BUBS. Among the other films, standouts are the insane comedy of the self-explanatory GIANT RUBBER MONSTER MOVIE, the gloriously bizarre visuals of DRACULA IN SPACE and the incredibly inventive “zombie apocalypse from a dog’s eye view” depicted in PLAY DEAD.

5:30 brings us “International Terror: Shorts From Around the World,” and reprises Germany’s A MOMENT OF SILENCE AT THE GRAVE OF ED GEIN and the UK’s NEXT EXIT. In addition, Brazil is represented by the plight of the journey of the blind Rafael in AS ÓRBITAS, Australia by the masked terror of CAT SICK BLUES, Canada by the existential dread of FOR CLEARER SKIES and Spain by the television-fueled insanity of BARIKU LIGHT.

We reconvene at 7 p.m. as the Atlanta chapter of the international film and animation association ASIFA joins forces with BA!FF to present the “Drawn and Quartered: Animation Program.” In addition to the intricately-constructed HERMAN BLUE, which local artist Ian Mark Stewart created using over 250 carved pumpkins, highlights include the Valentine’s Day-set NIGHT OF THE LOVING DEAD and the brilliantly macabre stop-motion of ABYSSUS ABUSSUM INVOCAT.

As the clock strikes nine, we explore the realm of body horror with the “Wave of Mutilation Shorts Program.” Local collective New Puppet Order delivers a horrifically funny tale of home invasion when a man discovers that an inter-dimensional gateway has opened up in the back of his skull in ED IS A PORTAL. And in addition to reprisals of BARIKU LIGHT and FOR CLEARER SKIES, another short you won’t want to miss is OTHER, which depicts a doctor’s extreme experiments in ridding his body of a rapidly-growing cancer. When an unforeseen development occurs with his equipment, he is determined to take his experiment all the way to witness the results.

The closing night feature delves further into body horror with an encore of AS ÓRBITAS, followed by the feature film THANATAMORPHOSE. This Canadian film poses the question, “what would you do if you woke up to find yourself slowly rotting away?” A bravura acting turn from Kayden Rose and amazing makeup effects from David Scherer and Rémy Couture combine with Éric Falardeu’s claustrophobic and intimate direction to create a bleak—and ultimately moving—portrait of sexuality, abuse, loss of control, alienation and liberation.

At $10 per screening block, or $40 for an all-access pass, Buried Alive! Film Festival continues to be the best bargain in town for anyone interested in the future of horror cinema, and the visionaries who push the boundaries of the genre.

Aleck Bennett is a writer, blogger, pug warden, pop culture enthusiast, raconteur and bon vivant from the greater Atlanta area. Visit his blog at doctorsardonicus.wordpress.com

The horror! The horror! Thanks to some dedicated monster-lovers, Atlanta has become the year-round capital city of Scary. This October, though, our local terrifying talent has outdone themselves in creepy creativity. Here are our reviews of five of the city’s hottest haunted attractions. One general tip for all: wear comfortable closed toe shoes and clothes that you don’t mind getting moist. Don’t worry. The monsters may tell you they are spurting you with blood or other bodily fluids, but it’s just water. Well, we think it is.

ATLRETRO’S HAINT OF THE SEASON: CHAMBER OF HORRORS

Chambers of Horror, Atlanta’s adults-only haunt behind The Masquerade, has come a long way baby from a torture porn extravaganza to a creepy crawl through a septic, gritty underworld. So we’re not only calling it this year’s most improved attraction but also a must-see, as long as you have a stomach for extreme violence and the phantasmagorically pornographic. Let’s be clear–you won’t be seeing parasexual activity, but nakedness and deformed organs are in view.

This year’s concept has the old Torture Co. burned to the ground, but some of its denizens have survived in caverns below, continuing their brutal pursuits. The journey begins in an elevator that shakes and shudders just enough to evoke a realistic ride down five stories with a most unwelcome host. Once below, what makes this year’s Chambers stand out is its atmosphere and acting. You really feel like you are deep below, passing through cave-like passages between disturbing dioramas, such as a monstrous birthing, which look believably real rather than staged. Sure, there were some jumpy scares and victims predictably cried out mournfully for help, but it was their torturers beckoning with a longing evocative of Clive Barker’s Cenobites, who truly tantalizing us with a promise of pain, both excruciating but yet beautiful. Open through Nov. 2.

LABOR OF LOVE: ATLANTA ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE

When most folks, even in the horror biz, think of haunts, they peg them as places you walk or ride through with scares that jump out at you. Forget all that passive voyeurism with ATLANTA ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE (AZA), which this year again boasts two attractions and a zombie shoot. Since its founding four years ago, this bizarre brainchild of Shane Morton, aka Professor Morte of the The Silver Scream Spookshow, and Johnny Rej, former owner of the Plaza Theatre, distinguished itself as a fully immersive experience where visitors literally become part of a realistic plot line of a zombie incursion. Some may consider it off the beaten track just south of I-285 at the Moreland Avenue exit, but the abandoned aura of this industrial area only adds to the apocalyptic feel, and there’s no discounting that having the full run of Safety Wolf, a derelict motel/truck stop turned paintball course, opens up a toxic host of possibilities.

What we love about this year’s AZA’s three attractions is that they steer away from George Romero, WALKING DEAD and other military-industrial plague zombie stories. That doesn’t mean there aren’t military types running around with paintball automatic weaponry, but rather that the cumulative effect is a love affair with some classic horror tropes in creative ways which frankly we’ve never seen at other haunts, which appeal to the Retro as well as the contemporary horror fan, and which will delight everyone who is tired of zombies, too. We don’t want to reveal any spoilers, so all we’ll say about the first main new attraction is that it is quintessentially Shane and will especially delight old school Spookshow fans. This is a good point to note that AZA’s staff includes many Spookshow members and attendees, and that passion permeates every aspect of this team effort of true old-school monster movie fans. The second experience incorporates the woods behind the motel again and returns to the same Lovecraftian territory with the dead raised by Cthulhu-worshipping cultists as last year, but expect different guides, twists and a much stronger climax. Even the zombie shoot rises to another level this year. Shooters don’t stand and aim at zombie targets, but rather get to run from room to room with a safety helmet and weapon just like they would in a real zombie apocalypse.

In sum, ATLRetro couldn’t have had more fun. It’s not a haunt or even just an immersive theater experience, it’s a labor of love not just by Shane Morton but also embodying the heart and soul of what makes Atlanta’s monster movie community truly unique and –hell, we’ll dare to say it– the best in the nation. Open through Nov. 2.

MOST GOTHICALLY GORGEOUS: NETHERWORLD

Consistently ranked as the nation’s best Halloween attraction, Netherworld is also completely homegrown rather than corporately conceived. Founders Billy Messina and Ben Armstrong and a dedicated team of designers, painters, sculptors and other artists deserve ever kudo imaginable for crafting a Gothic wonderland in a Norcross commercial space. Every year it gets bigger and better, yes, making us invoke Clive Barker again–a literal manifestation of Midian, where the Monsters live in his novella CABAL and the movie version NIGHTBREED (1990).

The ATLRetro team doesn’t scare easily, so we just walked slowly in awe of the bizarre beauty from graveyards of gargoyles to mirrored mazes, decadent dioramas inhabited by vampires and other classic monsters to sinister steampunk laboratories, weird werewolf lairs to abysses inhabited gigantic Lovecraftian elder Gods. NETHERWORLD also always features a second haunt that is usually more slasher/contemporary horror in its bent–read toxic waste and chainsaws. This year’s BOGEYMAN was particularly fun, our favorite part being the bouncy dancing killer clowns. Yeah, you read that right. We usually are totally freaked out by clowns, and these clowns were mighty creepy. Or maybe we just enjoyed scaring them by hopping along. Open through Nov. 3.

BEST BATTLE OF THE BEASTS: MONSTROSITY CHAMPIONSHIP WRESTLING AT SIX FLAGS FRIGHT FEST

Every October Six Flags Over Georgia is overrun by ghastly ghouls, terrifying monsters and psychotic mad scientists, but their 2013 Fright Fest has grown hellishly bigger than ever. They’ve upped the ante with 11 haunted attractions and four live shows, but for us the real Retro treat was Monstrosity Championship Wrestling (MCW), which has taken over the Axis Arena in Gotham City for four afternoon shows at 2, 3, 4 and a big Battle Royale featuring all the big bad beasts at 5 p.m.

Yup, we mean the same MCW that was cooked up by our BFF blog Wrestling with Pop Culture (check out our Kool Kat interview with blogger Jonathan Williams here) and “Atlanta’s Renaissance man of horror” Shane Morton (check out his Kool Kat interview here). Yup, Shane has been doubling up on October weekends with MCW during the day as The Silver Scream Spookshow’s “ghost host with the most” Professor Morte and then heading to supervise his other baby Atlanta Zombie Apocalypse (AZA) at night. With the assistance of the horrifically humorous Ringmaster, Morte crowns the bloody victors in matches made in hell as MCW’s deadly contenders duke it out in fearsome full-throttle matches. On a recent Sunday, we saw such creepy contenders collide as MCW faves Dragula, the Alabama Wolfman, Pandora, Bad Santa and more! When they’re not bringing their pro-league fight club for monsters to Six Flags, they can be seen battling it out on their home turf, Club Famous every first Friday of the month. Weekends through Oct. 27.

ATLANTA’S NEWEST HAUNT: CONTAINMENT

The newest haunt on the Atlanta scene is Containment, located underneath Atlantic Station. As described on Containment’s website, “An assortment of demonic artifacts collected by the mysterious Frightmares, Inc., was to be safely transported by train through Atlanta as part of a convoy of secured cargo containers. ut a mysterious chain of events changed everything. The train derailed, causing the containers to crash onto the Atlantic Station property, followed by a series of unexplained incidents, disturbing behavior and mysterious disappearances.”

Visitors pass through 19 cargo containers featuring bizarre medical equipment, creepy dolls, apocalyptic motorcycle riders, redneck cannibals, even a Victorian greenhouse. Other than the occasional character jumping out of the shadows at you, there aren’t too many big scares, but there are quite a lot of interesting ‘artifacts’ to look at in the 25,000 square feet, quarter-mile long haunt. Containment is open through November 3rd.
I’ll tell you that from my experience. Dozens of Klonopin 2mg drugs were taken with no result at all! Just don’t raise up the doctor’s prescripted dosage and all will go fine!

Thanks to Melanie Crew and Rebecca Perry for their assistance with Six Flags Fright Fest/MCW and Containment.

Buried Alive! Film Fest; Friday, Nov. 9 7 p.m. – 11 p.m.; Saturday, Nov. 10 4 p.m. – 11 p.m.; Plaza Theatre; Schedule here; Tickets $20 (all access, both days), $5 per programming block, available at Plaza box office.

By Aleck Bennett
Contributing Writer

Just when you thought it was safe to go back into Atlanta’s historic Plaza Theatre, the Buried Alive! Film Fest (BA!FF) returns the weekend of November 9-10 to once again delve into all things horrific and fantastic.

The festival was founded by local horror fiend Luke Godfrey, whom you’ll know as the co-creator of Chambers of Horror (Atlanta’s only adult Halloween attraction) and the award-winning film series Splatter Cinema, as well as being the head undead behind Zombie Walk Atlanta. Buried Alive! Film Fest has proven year after year to be one of the many reasons that Atlanta is recognized as among the horror capitals of the world, and this year proves to be no exception as Festival Director and filmmaker Blake Myers has loaded the schedule with the weird, the wonderful and the outright outrageous.

The festival launches Friday night at 7 p.m. with a suite of shorts under the umbrella “BIZARRO: A Journey Into the Gory.” The program opens and closes with, respectively, two celebrated selections from the 2011 H.P. Lovecraft Film Festival: Thomas Nicol’s THE WINDOW INTO TIME and EDGAR ALLAN POE’S “THE RAVEN” from Christopher Saphire and Don Thiel (which was selected by Guillermo del Toro at the HPL Film Festival as one of his favorites). In between, we’re treated to a wide variety of short bursts of terror ranging from a mysterious plunge from London’s streets into the wilderness of Jonathan and Richard Chance’s TIMESLIP to the stop-motion animated skeletons of Theo Pingarelli’s DOPPELGANGER and IDLE WORSHIP.

ABED, directed by Ryan Lieske.

Following the shorts program, the short film ETHEREAL CHRYSALIS sets the stage for the opening double feature of ABED and MANBORG. ABED is based on the controversial short story of the same name by two-time Bram Stoker Award-winning author Elizabeth Massie. The film was written and directed by filmmaker Ryan Lieske (CLEAN BREAK, DOWN TO SLEEP, which screened at the 2010 and 2011 BA!FFs) and co-produced by Fangoria scribe Philip Nutman, who also was an associate producer and co-wrote the screenplay for JACK KETCHUM’S THE GIRL NEXT DOOR. Though the movie places us in the midst of a zombie uprising, it primarily centers on the building horror and desperation developing between two living characters: Meggie, whose husband was lost early on, and her mother-in-law who is intent on bringing some normalcy back into this world at any cost. MANBORG, on the other hand, is an over-the-top tribute to blood-soaked 1980s sci-fi/action flicks like ROBOCOP and TERMINATOR. The movie, in which a dead soldier finds himself resurrected as a cyborg killing machine, is the latest insane creation from the collective known as Astron-6, was directed by team member Steven Kostanski and won “Best of Fest” at the 2012 Boston Underground Film Festival.

On Saturday, buckle your theater seatbelts (they make those, right?) for a day chock-full of tasty morsels you won’t want to pass up. It all starts at 4 p.m. with a shorts program dedicated to “Serial Killer and Alternate Universes.” An international smorgasbord of horrific delights awaits you; from the quiet terrors of SILENCE (from Italy’s Angelo and Giuseppe Capasso) to the agoraphobic serial killer of HIM INDOORS (from the UK’s Paul Davis). That’s followed by a delicious selection of “Rotten Peaches,” featuring four short films from local filmmakers.

The poster for Javier Chillon's DECAPODA SHOCK, which screens during Friday's 7 p.m. shorts program.

Saturday night’s feature is a real NAILBITER. The Grand Jury prizewinner for Best Feature Film at Shriekfest 2012, Patrick Rea’s latest feature depicts a woman and her three daughters seeking refuge from an oncoming tornado in the basement of a seemingly abandoned house. However, they soon find that someone—or something—is upstairs and is intent on keeping them trapped below deck.

The festival closes with a real treat for even the most casual of horror film fans: a screening of Dario Argento’s 1977 masterpiece SUSPIRIA. Jessica Harper stars as Suzy Banyon, a newly-arrived ballet student at the celebrated Tanz Akademie of Frieburg, who finds herself ensnared in the machinations of a coven of witches under the leadership of Madame Blanc, played by Joan Bennett. Bennett, best known to horror fans as Elizabeth Collins Stoddard from television’s DARK SHADOWS (and its first big-screen adaptation, 1970’s HOUSE OF DARK SHADOWS), returned to the screen after a seven-year absence for this, her final feature film, and brought with her that role’s association with gothic romanticism which was so integral to the series. SUSPIRIA is simultaneously strikingly beautiful and brutal, evocative both of fairy tales and of the hyper-violent gialli of Italian cinema. And it features what is perhaps one of the greatest (if not the single greatest) musical score (composed and performed by the Italian band Goblin) to ever accompany a horror film. In fact, the film is unimaginable without it. (Ed. note: Read our Retro Review by Andrew Kemp here)

A mere $20 for all of this? (And only $5 for each individual block of programming?) It’s the best bargain in town for anyone remotely interested in horror as a genre, much less the hardcore genre fanatic. Tickets are available at the Plaza box office, so stop by and get yours as soon as possible.

Aleck Bennett is a writer, blogger, pug warden, pop culture enthusiast, raconteur and bon vivant from the greater Atlanta area. Visit his blog at doctorsardonicus.wordpress.com.

No one can exorcise the Afro Demon outta Atlanta's Man of 1000 Halloween Faces Eddie Ray.

By Eddie Ray
Contributing Writer

As I sit here and write this, I am listening to the score to HALLOWEEN III: SEASON OF THE WITCH, editing an “I love Halloween” video for YouTube, working on my Zombie Walk costume, working on my Halloween night costume, and patching up my costume for Atlanta Zombie Apocalypse. So to say I work for Halloween is an understatement. I do love Halloween, but the truth is I believe in Halloween. There is a huge difference. Real Halloween kids start decorating and celebrating Halloween on September 1, and the party lasts until November 1.

I was taught this when I was very young, and I began saying that I love and work for Halloween when I was probably about 6 or 7 years old. I grew up in a Halloween house with ghost stories, horror movies and even a Halloween friend who helped show me that I needed to help keep the season of Halloween exciting and moving forward. It was my duty in some ways. When I was little I was so excited to see the leaves change color and for the month of September to begin so that I could grab all of our Halloween decorations and hang them on doors, in windows and plug up orange lights outside.

Halloween is a magical time – notice I said “is” and not “was” – for me and all the Halloween Kids who love the season as much I do. I grew up on the south side of Atlanta in Suburbia, which meant trick-or-treating was a big deal for all the kids. I even loved that there was a possibility that your candy could be the last shit you ate because it could be poisoned. Will it be a trick or will it be a treat? My family would have big Halloween parties every year, which I eventually took over and began decorating for, DJ-ing for and making my own elaborate costumes for. I even designed haunted houses in the yard to go through, and since I loved horror so much, I began making horror films when I was about 10 years old. I didn’t say that shit was good; I was 10!

A young Eddie Ray goes gangster.

I think a lot of Halloween Kids grew up this way in Atlanta, and I would eventually met some of them in the future. I believe that we were all meant to find each other. I met Luke Godfrey during the filming of a low-budget zombie movie. He had just started the first Zombie Walk in Atlanta (watch a video filmed by Eddie at this year’s walk on Sun. Oct. 14 here), and we became friends right off. He would later open up the haunted attraction Chambers of Horror with Nick Morgan. This was the first haunted attraction/house I ever acted in. I met Jonny Rej (co-owner of The Plaza) and Shane Morton through the Plaza Theatre, and now I help them train actors, direct scenes and act in their haunted attraction, the Atlanta Zombie Apocalypse [If you missed our ATLRetro feature on AZA, click here]. I have always loved haunted houses/attractions growing up and go to all the ones that Georgia has to offer. I met special effects artist Blake Myers through a friend of mine, and we rambled on about John Carpenter for a while and have been friends ever since. Now he is doing effects for horror films like V/H/S, and he helps run the Buried Alive Film Festival (Nov. 9-10, 2012 at the Plaza).

Eddie Ray gives a Red Scare to the GA Capitol during Atlanta Zombie Walk.

These are just a few of the friends that I help with different Halloween events throughout the month of October. The point is we all grew up the same way, and we loved horror and Halloween. Now we keep the Halloween dream alive every year with events, horror attractions, parades and films that are made here. Atlanta really is a horror and Halloween town, because we help make it that way. It’s fun for all ages, races, sexes and sexualities. Halloween is for all who love it. I am proud to live in a Halloween town like Atlanta. Now get out there and support all the Halloween fun Atlanta has to offer you!

Here are some reasons why Atlanta is a horror/Halloween town!

A. Hello, the CDC is here.

B. There is a shitload of foreclosed and abandoned creepy-ass buildings here.

C. A shit-ton of ghost stories from Atlanta’s rocky-ass past. Savannah is always listed as one of the most haunted places in America. I grew up near a DEVIL’S CHURCH ROAD! It was Spooky Dookie!

D. Zombie Walks,  Zombie Prom, WALKING DEAD (TV Show), DANCE OF THE DEAD (Movie), Rob Zombie’s HALLOWEEN 2 (Movie), DEAR GOD! NO! (Movie) and V/H/S  (Movie)  all happen or were filmed here.

E. All the amazing horror make-up effects people who live here.

F. The Buried Alive Film Festival, at which I was winner of the Audience Choice Award for SATANIC PANIC; BAND OUT OF HELL last year. Yay, me!

G. Ponce Hookers. I was chased by one once.

H. People come down to Atlanta from other cities to celebrate Halloween here.

I. Little 5 Points Halloween Parade.

J. Silver Scream Spookshow

K. All the amazing haunted attractions here [Ed. note: including Netherworld, the Atlanta Zombie Apocalypse, Chambers of Horror, Dark Harvest and more].

L. Honey Boo Boo. I’m kidding, I love her!

M. All the Halloween parties at bars and clubs like Mary’s, The Goat Farm and Sauced.

N. Splatter Cinema.

O. The Real Housewives of Atlanta.

P. Corn Mazes.

Eddie Ray as MC Eat Yo Brains Out!

Q. Me, bitch!

R. Most of my close friends love Halloween and really get into it with me, and we begin planning for Halloween in June. They make me proud with their costumes.

S. Halloween kids are all ages!

T. We all love Halloween here!

Okay here are some things to do this Halloween in Atlanta.

1. Atlanta Zombie Apocalypse: I work in this one now, and I play a cop who helps you fight off zombies in an EVIL DEAD style horror movie, with clues, the occult and pretty ladies!!!! You are literally running for your life, and it’s exciting and scary as hell. Turns out I am really good at this shit. I have done it for two years in a row and this is my third year. Yes, we are the Zombie Capital of the world now. It’s a Zombie Hell in Atlanta, G.A. Baby!

2. Chambers of Horror: This was the first haunted attraction I worked in, and it’s adult-themed, scary, FUCKED UP, and amazing. Check this Rated X haunt out for a good time and maybe a turn on. (Read ATLRetro’s article on last year’s Chambers here)

3. Marys Hallo-Weenie Party – (Friday Oct. 26) For a good time on Halloween, call Mary’s; it’s a cool place to go. They make Halloween a big deal and have the most outlandish costumes at any club or bar I have ever seen. I always take my ass by there in October.

Atlanta's Scariest Halloween Kid Duet: John Wayne Gacy, aka Eddie Ray, takes a mugshot with Professor Morte of the Silver Scream Spookshow, aka Shane Morton.

4. Little 5 Points Halloween Parade – (Sat. Oct. 20, 4 p.m.) – I have been in the Halloween parade for about four years now, and it’s so much fun to dress up and walk down the streets of Little 5 Points in a creepy costume. Not to be missed, and if you can be in it then get in it! Watch here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=WPnIaOSYERA

5. Halloween Party at The Goat Farm II – (Sat. Oct. 27, 8 p.m.) – It’s back from the dead, and more blood-curdling than ever. Join them for an evening of debauchery, spectacles and spooky surprises at every corner. It’ll be a night that’ll haunt your memories. You’ve been warned. For more info, check out Scout Mob here.

Eddie Ray goes old school as The Green Ghost from SCOOBY DOO.

6. Plaza Theatre/Spookshow: THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (1925; starring Lon Chaney, Man of 1000 Faces)- Oct. 19, 20, 21; and full stage show by Professor Morte and his ghoulish gang for BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN  (1935; starring Boris Karloff and Elsa Lancaster) – Oct. 27 at 1 p.m. and 10 p.m.

7. Twin Peaks Prom Night (Sun. Oct. 28, 8 p.m. ) – People will be encouraged to come dressed as characters from TWIN PEAKS or other David Lynch movies, as well as prom attire. Come out to enjoy a swanky dinner, snacks and cocktails from the always stellar menu at Sauced, plus DJs will be spinning classic haunting music from the ‘50s & ‘60s to transport you to a different era.

Don't mess with Eddie Ray and these tough, battle-scarred babes of the Atlanta Zombie Apocalypse.

The rest of the nation thinks Atlanta is the zombie capital of America because THE WALKING DEAD is filmed here. But the undead walked here long before Hollywood arrived and the best local zombie activities are completely conceived by homegrown brains.

First off, mark your calendar and break out your creepiest make-up for not one, but two Zombie Walks. Organized by Luke Godfrey, one of the sick brains behind Splatter Cinema, Zombie Walk Atlanta 2012 is this Sunday Oct. 14. This seventh annual event is the city’s largest and starts at Wonderroot at 3 p.m., but show up much earlier if you need help with your make-up. After you’ve walked with the dead, head over to Luke’s other bloody creation, Chambers of Horrors. For more about Luke and the city’s most extreme adults-only horror attraction, read last year’s ATLRetro interview with Luke here.

The dead don’t just have their day inside the Perimeter. The 2012 Marietta Zombie Walk  is Saturday October 27 from 5 to 7 p.m. during the Carnival of Doom festival. Register and buy a T-shirt here.

Finally, every night is The Night of the Living Dead at the Atlanta Zombie Apocalypse, now in its own third season and expanded to include two different walking attractions, Curse of the Undead and ZWar and a zombie shoot at Safety Wolf, the paintball combat complex off Moreland Avenue, just south of I-285 (open Thurs.-Sun. nights throughout October and on Oct. 31). Set in and around a two-story abandoned motel, this more-than-100,000-square-foot attraction was nightmared up by the maniacal minds of local horror Renaissance man/make-up artist Shane Morton (Silver Scream Spookshow, Gargantua, Dear God! No!, Dracula The Rock Opera, etc.) and Jonny Rej (Plaza Theatre). Much more than your traditional walk-through haunt with jump-out monsters, AZA delivers a total immersion “experience,” in which attendees interact along the way with a variety of colorful characters living and undead. It’s sometimes hard to know who to trust but if someone says “run,” let’s just say you can be sure zombies are around, and if you don’t, you may get bitten and infected yourself or worse – eaten for your brains!

In “Curse of the Undead,” the origins of the zombie apocalypse are cultists reanimating the dead with arcane incantations. If you’re an EVIL DEAD fan, this one’s for you which makes the most of the addition of four acres of woods and even includes a zombie-killing hero named Bruce! My group was fortunate to have the protection of a police officer, played by talented local blogger filmmaker Eddie Ray (SATANIC PANIC: BAND OUT OF HELL) who did a great job of making us aware of a certain missing person problem and even imbued a little Southern-fried humor. FYI, we also encountered a few other familiar faces from the Silver Scream Spookshow and the Atlanta music scene.

Classic horror fans also will enjoy nods to Lovecraft (apropos since The Necronomicon raises THE EVIL DEAD) and the whole subgenre of B-movies featuring robed Satanists from THE DEVIL RIDES OUT (1968) to RACE WITH THE DEVIL (1975). Wear comfortable shoes (open-toes are no-nos) and watch where you step in the woods to not trip on tree roots. The journey is well worth a travel, but after all the build-up, my group’s one disappointment was that we expected one more final big scare that we didn’t get. AZA is constantly evolving and tends to improve with every week, so perhaps that may change.

“ZWar” picks up where the last two AZAs left off with the sinister Center for Disease Development (CDD), now developing a high-tech mega-weaponized zombie. Last year introduced an ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK-like scenario with a seedy encampment of humans as potentially dangerous as the undead. ZWar begins outside in the back parking lot with a similar brutal gang of people who use zombies for sport and a redneck overlord demanding our group steal drugs from the CDD for them. Once indoors, zombies menace, a brawny commando protects us with a machine gun and there’s the prerequisite mad scientist, but things really heat up when the scientist’s nervous victim takes the lead to find a way out. Without giving away any spoilers, the actor in that role did a fantastic job of upping the tension (does he really know where the exit is?). Will you make it out without encountering the CDD’s Necro-Tech warriors? Let’s just say, there’s no climax disappointment here.

Tickets to the Atlanta Zombie Apocalypse are $20 for each attraction, $30 for both ZWar and Curse, $30 for the zombie shoot or $55 for everything! Located just south of I-285, off Moreland Road; directions here.

Professor Morte puts a choke hold on Jonathan Williams. Photo courtesy of Wrestling with Pop Culture.

When our BFF blog Wrestling with Pop Culture (WPC) decided to throw a one-year anniversary party on Wed. March 28 at The Masquerade, ATLRetro couldn’t help but get excited because Jonathan Williams, the mad mastermind behind our second favorite Atlanta-based pop culture blog, is the absolute personifcation of one Kool Kat. Long before either of us took that leap of faith to pull the trigger on our own projects, we found ourselves hanging together at those media receptions, dinners and openings that us freelance writers call breakfast, lunch, dinner and happy hour – that fine line that   keeps us from being “starving” artists more often than we’d like to admit.

Now we’d support anything Jonathan & WPC did, but we’ve got to admit that he’s put together one helluva birthday party. One of the sweetest, glammest Kool Kats ever, Amber Taylor, is hosting! Death is a Dialogue and Needeep are rocking! Monstrosity Championship Wrestling hosted by our favorite Ghost Host with the Most, Professor Morte of the Silver Scream Spookshow! And it’s the official after-party of the Atlanta Film Festival‘s screening of Platinum Championship Wrestling documentary THE BOOKER! Luchador face and body-painting! Raffle! Chambers of Horror photo booth! Wrestling photographer Jay Taylor!

OK, we’d better shut up now and let Jonathan fill you in about WPC’s secret origins, more about the crazy party action and how it all came together, and what else he’s up to. All of which makes us think we need to get busy planning our own ATLRetro first birthday shindig – now that the bar has been set, stay tuned, kids…

Why did you decide to pull the trigger on Wrestling with Pop Culture?

I’ve been a freelance entertainment journalist for several years and have written for local publications like The Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Creative Loafing, as well as national publications such as Gothic Beauty and Pro Wrestling Illustrated. But the most fun I ever has as a writer was when I was interning as a college student for Sideshow magazine. That was a free monthly that Jon Waterhouse did, and it covered all aspects of pop culture, from music and movies to pro wrestling and comic books. While I have had the opportunity to write about some cool stuff since Sideshow folded up its tent, I’ve never found another publication that covers the kookier side of pop culture the way that magazine did.

A couple of years ago, when the economy started to tank and freelance work became more and more scarce, I started thinking about starting my own publication. With online media taking over much of the readership that used to rely on print publications, I thought starting a website would be the cheapest and easiest way to go. I also knew that I wanted to focus on professional wrestling in a way that I had never seen any other publication do. It seems like most mainstream publications usually poke fun at wrestling, and traditional wrestling magazines focus solely on what happens in the wrestling world without exploring wrestling’s connections to other forms of entertainment.

From its earliest days as a carnival sideshow attraction through its territorial days, when wrestling made a name for itself across the country with regional TV shows, to the current WWE-dominated scene that allows wrestlers to cross over into the mainstream as action heroes, musicians and other forms of entertainment, pro wrestling has been embedded in Americana and pop culture for decades. Wrestling with Pop Culture covers all these aspects of wrestling, as well as other forms of entertainment that appeal to people who are as fascinated with luchadores and the pageantry of this form of performance art as they are with B horror movies, rock ‘n’ roll, comic books and other like-minded aspects of pop culture.

Jonathan Williams with Stephanie Anderson from Neon Armour Body Painting. Photo courtesy of Wrestling with Pop Culture.

Who else is involved with Wrestling with Pop Culture?

I’ve had a lot of help getting WPC off the ground. Tessa Horehled from DriveaFasterCar.com really helped me with all the technical aspects of getting a website running. KRK Ryden, the artist best known for his work with Devo, designed the black-and-white version of the logo, which I think illustrates the wacky world I envisioned perfectly. Amber Taylor, who will be the host of my show, has provided continued technical support. And I have a few guest writers, including “The Human Hand Grenade” dany only, who also co-hosts Georgia Wrestling Now, to do movie reviews and things like that. Other than that, a large majority of the interviews and reviews you see on WPC are done by me. I’m also working on a comic strip, which will hopefully debut in the next few months, that will further explore the world Ryden helped create with his image.

It sounds like this party is going to be pretty awesome. How did everything fall into place?

I initially wanted to do something last August that incorporated live wrestling and a few rock bands, and concluded with a viewing of a WWE pay-per-view. That never materialized for various reasons, but as the first anniversary of WPC approached I thought about how I could try to pull off something like that again. I first contacted some potential sponsors and, thankfully, found some good ones early on. Pabst Blue Ribbon has been very supportive; then media outlets Creative Loafing and Scoutmob got involved. Things really started falling into place just a few weeks ago as the Atlanta Film Festival announced its screening of the Platinum Championship Wrestling documentary THE BOOKER on March 28. Since the Masquerade is right down the street from the Midtown Art Cinema, and since PCW runs shows there every month or so, I thought it would be a great venue for an event with wrestling and bands.

Can you tell us more about the bands and wrestling activities?

Death is a Dialogue and Needeep, [two] great bands who are also great at getting their names out there, both agreed to do the show. Although I wanted to take advantage of PCW’s fans being in the area that night, I actually wanted to do something a little different with the wrestling portion of the show. Last October, the Atlanta Zombie Apocalypse set up a wrestling ring in its parking lot to provide entertainment for the people waiting in the long lines to get in. I didn’t get to see either of those shows, but I heard from some of the PCW wrestlers that were involved that the promotion was Monstrosity Championship Wrestling and there were matches that included actual monsters, as well as a match that pitted a Bible-thumping Jesus freak against Satan himself. It turns out Prof. Morte from the Silver Scream SpookShow is somehow involved in this promotion, so I contacted him, and he agreed to do some monster wrestling matches at my event.

Also, Amber Taylor, whose band the Sexual Side Effects is playing another Atlanta Film Festival event at the Goat Farm the following night, where their new video will be premiering, also wanted to be part of the action. So since she’s sort of walking freak show unto herself, I decided to let her be the host of the whole thing. With additional sponsors like Criminal Records, Adrenaline Fitness and Ox’s Wrestling Ring Rentals, I feel like the event covers Atlanta’s pop culture scene in much the same way the website covers various aspects of pop culture. The Atlanta Film Festival has also made this event one of its official after-parties and PCW recently put out a challenge to MCW, so things just get more and more interesting by the day. And the Academy Theatre, where PCW has its matches every Friday night, is selling tickets for only $5 through this Friday. Otherwise, tickets are $8 in advance, $10 at the door or free for AFF pass holders.

And did we hear right that there’s face and body painting, artists, a raffle, something to do with those crazy maniacs from Chambers of Horror?

Other festivities include luchadore-inspired face and body painting from Neon Armour, raffle prizes from Adrenaline Fitness; Chocolate F/X; monster artist Dave Cook; Monster Joe Coffee, who also made the WPC T-shirts; and lots of other new stuff coming in each day. Chambers of Horror is also going to have a photo booth there, and local wrestling photographer Jay Taylor will be snapping pics.

Jonathan Williams of Wrestling with Pop Culture. Photo credit: Neda Abghari.

While Wrestling with Pop Culture is your big baby, what other writing projects are you up to right now?

In addition to keeping WPC from tapping out, I am also the Editor-in-Chief for The Creative Process, which is part of The Creatives Project. I still write a monthly art column for Stomp and Stammer called Sheer Art Attack, and I have weekly music contributions to Creative Loafing. I occasionally contribute to PWI and Drive a Faster Car, and I’m also working on some articles for the Miami New Times about all the WrestleMania festivities that will be taking place down there next week.